ICYMI: President Biden "fixed many of the problems of the early 2020s"

As Noah Smith describes today, President Biden's policies have "competently and effectively addressed" the most pressing issues he inherited when taking office, including:

Unemployment:

• "When Biden took office, there were 10 million fewer Americans with jobs than before the pandemic. By the time he leaves office, there will be 7 million more."
• "The U.S. economy grew much faster than the economies of other rich nations starting around 2021."

Inflation:

• "U.S. inflation came down much faster than inflation in the other G7 countries. By 2023, America had lower inflation than those other countries."
• "Biden allowed an unprecedented amount of oil and gas drilling in the U.S. In fact, he allowed even more fracking than Trump did. And as a result, U.S. oil and gas production surged to record highs. Cheap energy really helps reduce prices for everything, since energy is an input into all production processes."

Crime:

• "Crime in America soared during and after the summer of 2020, and continued to rise slightly in 2021. […] But the post-pandemic crime wave in America started receding in 2022, just two years after it began."
• "Biden himself rejected calls to defund the police even at the height of the Floyd protests in 2020. Biden's consistent pro-police rhetoric may have helped encourage a stronger pro-policing attitude among Democrats in the U.S., overriding progressive activists who wanted to punish law enforcement."

Border crossings:

• "[The Biden administration introduced] a tough bipartisan border bill (which Trump managed to kill), and taking a bunch of measures to crack down on asylum. The crackdown worked. Border crossings plummeted like a rock."
• "In the long term, fixing the border will require amending U.S. asylum law to deny asylum claims to people who cross the border illegally. This will permanently remove the incentive to violate the country's borders in search of asylum."

Manufacturing:

• "The short version here is that all of Trump's tariffs and bluster failed to move the needle on U.S. manufacturing one iota. In fact, Trump's term in office saw America fall even further behind China in high-tech manufacturing."
• "Thanks to Biden, for the first time in decades, America is now expected to claw back market share in the semiconductor industry. All my life I've been hearing politicians like Trump bluster about reviving U.S. manufacturing, but Biden was the first one who actually did something that worked."

There's more to do, but, as Smith puts it, "When Biden took office, the country had high unemployment, accelerating inflation, and soaring violent crime. By the time he leaves office, the country will have none of those things. That's quite an accomplishment."

Read more here: Democrats fixed many of the problems of the early 2020s